Big League Pals

They came, we laughed, they left. Here are some highlights.

1. Alli was on some sort of nostalgic gum kick all weekend. She emerged from my neighborhood convenience store with a bag of Big League Chew, which is sort of disgusting, you guys, despite our memories to the contrary. And then she bought us Fruit Stripe gum. I don't know what was up with all the kiddie gum, but shee-yoot. Certain childhood foods? Are FOUL.

2. We got into a whole thing about bad euphemisms that are used in romance novels for man junk, and I brought up the one that was discovered in a book at a beach house I rented once: "man root." The hilarity that ensued for Map about this term was boundless. It was all "man root" this, and "man root" that for the rest of the trip. I am so glad I brought that joy into her life.

3. Somehow, the question of what one would most like to bathe in, if one had to bathe in a food or beverage, came up. As it does. We pretty much agreed that chocolate pudding is what you want in that sort of a scenario. Feel free to steal that idea if the situation is ever presented to you. Our think tank has done all the brain work on that. You're welcome.

4. Map's birthday is in September, mine is in October, and Alli's is in November. We called up Alli's sister Steph and ordered us up one of Steph's much touted birthday songs. I have been hearing about these improvised birthday songs for a long time, but have never been given the gift. Oh. My. I wish I had audio to share with you. Steph did a sultry jazz number on speaker phone for us that consisted of the words "Happy Buhth-day, choo shoo choo" that almost made me puke laughing. It went on for a few minutes, and as soon as it was over, Steph's foreign exchange student apparently came into the room to ask if she was ok. You know a song is freaking awesome if people think you are injured while it's happening.

5. Nordic Boy and the three of us got our major dance on playing Just Dance on the Wii. If I had an exchange student I am fairly sure they would have skipped asking us if we were ok and just called 911.

6. In the morning when I heard Alli and Map were awake, I would slip out of my bed and go crawl into theirs, and we would talk ourselves awake. There are three people in the world I have done that with consistently in my life, and they were all in my house this weekend.

7. We took the ferry to Whidbey for an afternoon with Biogirl, and having my three favorite ladies all together made me really, really happy.

8. I dropped them both off at the airport on Monday and pretty much cried all the way home. I grew up with them five minutes away, and the fact that they are so far away now? I don't think I will ever, ever get used to that.